Vaughn's frown deepened. "By regulation, Sir Philip, such a request must come through channels, as you know."
"Mr. Vaughn." Drummond raised his voice enough to turn the heads of a few of the air-traffic controllers working nearby. "This is an urgent matter, directly affecting national defense." He lowered his voice again.
The guy had a flair for the dramatic, Bolan had to admit. But then, a man would have to become an accomplished actor if he expected to survive the double life.
"As tower chief," Drummond went on, "I believe you are aware of the functions of Transworld I/E?" It was plain that Vaughn detested having rank pulled on him. But he spun on his heel and went to one of the vacant control terminals. He flicked a selector knob and a series of green-tinted images flashed onto the screen, each showing a different radar array. He studied one, then straightened.
"Approximate latitude 55 degrees, 50 minutes north," he announced. "Longitude 18 degrees, 32 minutes east. Heading roughly east-northeast."
Bolan was at the chart on the wall near the entry staircase. The KGB plane and its cargo of top-secret U.S. Navy defense equipment was over the Baltic Sea, and would be for about ten more minutes.
"If there is nothing else you require..." Vaughn began, in a tone that made it clear it hoped that were the case.
"A phone," Bolan said.
Vaughn looked at him for the first time. "Now, who might you..."
"Your office, Mr. Vaughn, if you please," Drummond broke in. "I assure you we will not be long."
The tower chief's office was a cubicle above the main control room, reached by a spiral staircase. To one side was a control terminal with a radio set to the control frequencies-for monitoring employee performance, Bolan guessed. Vaughn gave both men a suspicious glance, as if he were afraid they were going to steal something as soon as they were alone. When he had gone, Bolan motioned Drummond into the chair. He unslung the camera case, lay it on Vaughn's desk, and let himself gingerly down beside it.
Keeping his eye on his prisoner, Bolan allowed himself a moment of rest. The pain in his shoulder was becoming a presence, an increasing reminder that the beat had to be on double time now.
A panel on the camera case slid open to reveal a false bottom. Inside was an electric cord on a spring-loaded reel.
Bolan pulled it out and plugged it in. Unclasping and lifting the lid revealed a simple control panel consisting of two toggle switches, a zero-center meter, a red indicator light, and a recessed button with a plastic safety cap. This was another Gadgets Schwarz special, a radio transmitter designed to emit a low-power but extremely narrow beam of UHF impulse. It was adaptable to point-to-point communication, or as a remote control. It was now in the latter configuration.
Bolan flicked up the first toggle and a whip antenna extended from the case's top. He pointed it roughly east-northeast. When he worked the second toggle the meter's needle activated, veering to the left. Bolan corrected, and the needle trued toward center. The indicator light began to blink.
A few beats later it was a steady bright red, and the needle rode the zero-center mark.
In the attache case aboard the KGB plane, which the pilot Rouballin believed contained the guidance systems spec manual, there was a homing device.
The homing device was ganged to a remote detonator, which was in turn wired to about ten pounds of C4 explosive. Now the homing device was sending a message back to its master.
Mack Bolan flipped the safety cap off the activator and sent a message back: Greetings from the Man from Hellfire.
Bolan slumped where he sat, drained. His chest felt like someone was holding a red-hot branding iron against it, and he was aware his breathing had become ragged. The numbers were toppling downright on him. But the mission awaited confirmation.
Hi forced his fingers to accomplish the operation of repacking the remote detonator, then moved to Vaughn's radio monitor and turned it on.
He clicked the channel selector, heard only routine communication until he hit the last frequency.
"Go ahead, TWA 1456," a controller in the room below said. "Ah, Heathrow, we've got a possible situation here." The American pilot's voice had a faint Texas accent, cut by an obvious tension. He gave his coordinates, nearly the same ones Vaughn had announced for the Russian plane.
"Possible mid-air explosion," the pilot went on about ten miles off the port wing, five thousand fee; lower. "My copilot says he spotted a twin-engine just before it blew." There was an audible intake of breath, but when the pilot went on his voice was still studiously calm. "Ah, she just blew again, Heathrow, like the tanks just went. Please advise, Heathrow."
Bolan flicked the channel selector again.
On another wavelength a woman controller's voice said, "Transworld I/E SKBLEDHGD, please come in." She was repeating the call when Bolan turned the set off.
"It appears you have accomplished what you set out to," Drummond said without inflection.
Simply lifting his head to look at the other man had become a painful effort for Bolan.
Drummond smiled slightly and came fluidly out of the chair, lunged at Bolan, both arms outstretched.
Before his momentum could carry him across the desk, the Detonics was in Bolan's hand.
Drummond stopped himself short.
Bolan realized he had come damned close to firing. He was rapidly dropping below one hundred percent.
The other man realized it as well. "You haven't forgotten your ah, promise, have you?" Drummond inquired carefully.
Bolan shook his head. "You're the sell-out, Drummond. Not me."
Drummond tried to reassemble the last shreds of his dignity. "Now then, there is no call."
Bolan gestured with the little .45. "Let's get out of here," he said wearily.
"It was a screw-up, Colonel Phoenix," the American agent named Voorhis said.
5
"All right," Bolan said. He winced involuntarily as the sting of antiseptic bit into the wound in his shoulder.
The doctor was a slightly built youthful looking man with bright red hair cut in an old-fashioned crew cut. He wore the insignia of a major in the regular British Army, Surgeon's Corps. The security clearance card clipped to his breast pocket read "M. Goldstein, M.D."
Voorhis leaned against one white wall, watching the doctor work. "We contacted Whitehall," he went on. "We told them it was sensitive, that you'd have to go it alone after we collared Charon. They didn't like it, but they agreed."
Dr. Goldstein jabbed a hypodermic needle into the hard muscle of Bolan's thigh. "A synthetic antibiotic called Keflex," he informed his patient. "A precaution against blood infection."
"The bodyguard, Lemon, he'd been kept in the dark about Drummond, like most everyone," Voorhis said. "SOP for MI5, just like us. The one you're really keeping in the dark is the mole. But just before it went down, Whitehall was supposed to tip Lemon and no one did. Damned sorry, Colonel."
"Never mind," Bolan said blankly.
The agent mistook Bolan's tone. "Listen, Colonel, there'll be a complete report. Heads will roll, depend on it."
Bolan sighed. "A complete report" was the essence of every good bureaucracy. Why take direct action when you could dissect the problem from every angle in writing first? The only problem was that dissection never got you anywhere. But action sure as hell did.
In any case, there was no use dwelling on what was already irreversible. It was hardly the first time in all the years of warfare that Mack Bolan had been shot; it would likely not be the last. He would heal, and there would be other firefights to come.